


Of power

by Kes



Series: Thor 2 Rewritten: The Shaded Tree [12]
Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Asgard, Dark Elves, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-02
Updated: 2014-11-21
Packaged: 2018-02-23 20:45:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,622
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2555066
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kes/pseuds/Kes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The battle is over and the funeral is past, but the war is not won; both sides have tasted only failure. Both in Asgard and among the dark elves, in the wake of the carnage over Gladsheim, a new resolution stirs as the preparations for renewed war continue.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

“Tell me, blade commander, how did the battle really go?” Rilkathe asks as soon as Alflyse appears from the coursing.

On her way, she had passed one of the Darkstar’s personal soldiers; they must have come to bring news. Her body aches, but she still takes off her mask to face the now-six _dahar_ luminaries and give the report, compares it to theirs. Four blades are gone, with all their soldiers; none were at full complement to start, but it is still a loss of six to thirteen per blade. Termanu, of her own blade, is dead; they had found eir body slumped at eir empty gun, dead of a blow to the head in the windy chaos above the city. It is not even all soldiers. Niade had explained, in hushed and sickened tones, that _emcaril_ had only flown because its commander had supplemented suddenly ill crew with former soldiers from the _darhyada_.

“May they rise once more in darkness.”

Syrgarm, one of the new luminaries, shakes eir head. “This is waste. Even if we return to the dark, what then?”

“We rebuild. There are enough of us, and who knows what could be waiting for us beyond the light? Life bereft – of what?”

“You are willing to accept any loss to return, on that tiny sliver of hope, Angith?” Kilru says, voice disbelieving. A crowd has formed around them, mutterings spreading with each word. Angith looks defiant, raises a shoulder.

“How else do we do it? Asgard is powerful, and we need the Aether – even if you disagree that we must return, you agree we need the Aether.” He turns to Rilkathe for support.

She frowns. “I don’t agree with you. We need the Aether, but we do not need it at maximum loss, which is what the Darkstar is offering. He may be doing it in the name of revenge, but that is a distraction. The issue is survival, and pursuing revenge is making it harder.”

Alflyse nods, abandons her impassive face. This is not her discussion – but still, it is, for these are her people, by birth and duty. Their fate is hers, their wounds her wounds.

“As for bringing darkness down across this lighted verse – is it for us to interfere in the course of a universe? Is that something that we have the right to do? And we are all the survivors of immense loss.” Rilkathe pauses, and Alflyse notices the slight tremor in her hand. “Is it right to inflict that upon others?”

“The Asgardians inflicted that loss,” Orekim shouts from the back, and several people call out agreement.

“All of them? Blade commander, you have seen the Asgardian city. Do they have darhyada?”

“Yes,” Alflyse says, and takes a deep breath. She barely hears the shuffle of discomfort from the people around her. There are things that have not been revealed about the attack, and the orbitals need to know them. Now is the chance, now that everyone is looking at her. Fear churns in her stomach. “When we were given our orders, our roles were specific. The blades that went down were not losses. They were sacrifices. And besides that, in the attack, the Darkstar was injured. My blade, feande blade, retrieved him and the Satellite from the palace. He was unconscious, blackened and twitching.” The deed is done, and she will stand or fall by it.

Noise erupts into being around her, a thousand conversations, and for a moment the luminaries are absorbed into the crowd as people rush to share their opinions with them. When it dies down, Syrgarm is the first to speak.

“He has already sacrificed every greatship and all their people, but for our ship, his own. My system was aboard one of them. So were many of yours,” ey says.

Rilkathe is staring into Alflyse’s eyes, teeth bared in something that could be a snarl or a smile. “And it was he that declared the orbitals gone, taking from us our own governance.”

“And you still flew for him,” Mithe says, but ey still seizes the news eagerly.

“It was just strategy.” Now many of the faces that turn to look at Angith are hostile. “In war, people die. Sometimes, commanders know they will die – is that not true, blade commander?”

Rilkathe would know how to answer that. “Yes, sometimes people die. Sometimes. It is still possible to send them to unnecessary, wasteful deaths – not every death in a war is just or right. When my system died, when Triblade went down – they were killed. He killed them. By Asgardian hands, yes, but he killed them, and that was not right, that was not – that was not.” Alflyse stops because her throat is too tight to get the air out through. Everyone is staring at her.

“I think there is precedence, for the trial of a Darkstar,” says Hadnyse. The quiet is near total.

Kilru shakes his head. “That may be so. But the orbitals are unrecognised and splintered, and he has a greater power than even the hethryada with him, guarding him.”

The mention of the Cursed sends a shiver through even the luminaries, and they soon disperse, the suggestion relegated to mutterings.

They do not forget, though, and Alflyse is called upon to manufacture an excuse and an escort for Syrgarm to go to the next level of the greatship, that occupied by _lihuad_ blade. Ostensibly, it’s to discuss responsibility for the _darhyada_ previously under Elthanor’s care, but everyone knows the true reasons; this orbital is only a small part of the whole of the orbitals system, and such governance only works when information is shared.

With that done, there is little for her to do. No further orders have come from the Darkstar or his Satellite; she assumes that they are occupied trying to bring him to his health again. The luminaries have taken over most of her duties here, and a blade commander need not be present at blade maintenance. Breathing space is so rare – what had she done with it before? The barrier between dark and light robs her of so much, but she remembers winning rec games against her blade, listening to her parent Luyor composing grand tales in eir rolling, gentle voice –

Suddenly she feels deeply alone. Who had she ever used it with before? None of these people. Most of her soldiers, all strangers to her at the start of the command, are either in _lihuad_ or at the blade, and she well remembers resenting a commander’s presence during maintenance.

At the edge of the cramped space, Rilkathe is crouched and speaking to a defensive-looking youngling with loose, unstyled hair falling around eir face and an arm around a small child. Hadnyse is deep in conversation with Mithe, who shoots her a look full of hostility. It stings. Kilru has vanished. Her gaze returns to Rilkathe – should she interrupt? In Triblade, she would not have hesitated, but there she would have known the people concerned, and there too she would have been but an ordinary soldier, the grown child of a familiar system. _I am not what I was,_ she thinks, and the loss is roaring inside her. It had been buried by the activity, but now, now in the wake of her outburst earlier…

Perhaps Rilkathe sees her looking, because she finishes her conversation and joins her. “How are you, after the battle and after that?” she asks.

“Well enough.” Alflyse is the blade commander here – she has already crumbled too much, or perhaps too little. “I am remembering.” There is no need for any more; the meaning is clear.

“Memory is something we are all cursed with, now. I was starting my own system, since my advisory duties were so gentle.” Tentatively she reaches out and touches Alflyse’s arm. Alflyse does not pull away. “I am glad of what you have done lately. I hope we will all have the chance to be.”

“We cannot know.” To play with events now is to play with every remaining darkling’s life. She hopes that the Darkstar remembers that.

“True. But we can believe that what we do is right.”


	2. Chapter 2

Sif’s chambers are some of the best in the palace, nestled into the same tower that holds Vitkelda’s empty suite, and they are so cramped that the only place Holma could find to lay a bed for Jane was in her dressing chamber. Still, when she rises before dawn to begin the rebuilding of the defence, Jane is up before her and sitting in the conference chamber with her codex, head in hands and pen a foot away on the table as though it had been slammed down and bounced. The meal on a tray beside her is untouched, and she does not seem to have noticed the other members of the household hovering in the doorway. “She’s been there since before I got up,” Holma says, looking ashamed. “I didn’t know whether I should get her out, since you’ll be wanting it this morning, but I took her breakfast anyway because of what you said.”

“It’s all right,” Sif replies, worry creasing her brow; she has, after all, sworn to take care of the Midgardian. “I will take mine in here, as well.” When she approaches, Jane doesn’t seem to notice, and she calls her name quietly before she sits beside her. The sound of laboured breathing is her only reply, and she seems so frail now. Sif gently lays a hand on her shoulder and notices the large, frustrated scribbling on the page. “What’s biting you?”

“It’s my fault they’re all dead.”

A horror. They should have been looking out for this. “Causation is too complicated for that, and I know too little of the circumstances to be able –”

“Don’t lie to me to make me feel better.”

“I’m not.” Sif barely feels awake, and her words come slowly, but she must speak. _Why did I have to be placed on this path?_ “But Jane, even if it were – I am a commander of men, men who are my friends. When battle comes around, I send them out, and they die. Sometimes I anticipate it, sometimes I do not. I do not bear the whole responsibility, but my orders still bring them there. Power comes in many guises, and your power and mine look very different, but at its heart all power is the same, all power is the power to kill. We must all learn to live with it, to honour the dead and ensure their losses are not in vain.”

Jane slams her palm down on the page, breath ragged. “That’s what I’m trying to do! I’m trying to sort it, I’m trying to find out how to handle it and stop it happening again, but I’m useless, I’m useless, I can’t think –”

“Jane.” Carefully she lays a hand on one of Jane’s sleeves. “You’re having a horror. No-one thinks well in a horror. You need to let it pass.” Her own stomach is clutching now, as though one threatens her as well. Dark elves in Asgard, ripping and tearing, and Fandral – she breathes deeper, and tells herself that it is only hunger.

Jane shakes her head. “I’m dying, Sif. If I stop, if I wait – if I don’t do it now, I might never.”

“But if you drive yourself too hard, you will drive yourself there sooner. Eat breakfast with me, at least.”

For the first time, she seems to notice the tray next to her. “I’m not hungry,” she begins, but before Sif can object, she pulls it towards her. The angle of her shoulders changes. “You’re right. A brain needs adequate nutrition to work properly.”

With Sif’s food comes a pile of messages like the one Thor had sent yesterday, and Jane focusses on watching her unfurl and ‘read’ them one by one. It’s strangely calming. “Thor is asking after you,” she says after the fourth.

“Can I ask you a question?” This is the time, she supposes – once the meal is over, presumably Sif will have her own thousand duties.

“Of course.”

“Why did Thor ask me to take that oath to you, not him? I mean, not that I, I don’t mean in a bad way, I’m just curious.” It sounds so bad, and she flushes.

Still, Sif doesn’t seem to mind. “For all Thor’s power, he’s still an heir, not the head of his clan. His household is the Allfather’s household. My household is mine alone, I am one of the great nobles of Asgard, and I too can trace my ancestors directly to the ancient kings of Gladsheim. Anyone who would hurt you while you are under my power, even the Allfather, must consider that first – and it is not an inconsiderable thing.”

She files it away and lets herself ask the first question she can think of, seizing the distraction. “You’re related?”

“Most of us are. It is rarely of much significance; in my case it is only so because the house has not passed out of the major line since its inception.” She shrugs.

“What’s the major line?”

“Heads of the clan.”

Jane asks a couple more questions, trying to let her subconscious pull itself together and start working on the problem at hand, but is interrupted by the communications beam springing into life on the more desklike side of the table. “Do you want me to leave?” There isn’t really anywhere else suitable for working in the tiny set of crowded rooms, but she has no place in a war council.

“Only if you would prefer to work unhindered by the tramping of boots, but I fear you won’t find anywhere quieter.”

“The library won’t open until noon, and I guess I shouldn’t go there alone anyway,” she says. It’s wishful thinking, but with the sudden reminder of what’s at stake… “I have to ask. The Aether is the key to this whole thing. If I can figure it out, maybe we can use it or something.”

To her surprise, Sif’s mouth twitches into a smile. “These are troubled times. With the defence of Asgard at stake, I think I can persuade someone to unlock it, and… there are things there that I could benefit from seeing in my work, as well. I will try.”


	3. Chapter 3

Dawn light spills into Asgard’s ruined throne-room, broken by the looming bulk of the dark elf ship still lying quiet among the rubble. The bodies are gone and the floor scrubbed free of blood, but the rebuilding has not yet started. At the side, around a functioning communications beam, a man operates a lightbox showing a gold-glowing map of Gladsheim for a grave audience. “According to my men’s survey, my king, only four of the guntowers are still operational,” says Hallorm, the new guildfather of the Masons’ Guild.

“Fourth Legion is ruined,” Hogun adds. “They have no commander, the compound is damaged. Many of them are dead, and most of the living are injured or heart-hurt.”

Odin and Thor exchange a look, and Thor notices how hard his father grips Gungnir. “The shock was great for everyone,” the king answers slowly. “But we must have a defence. Malekith will come again, he must.”

He must not. Thor frowns. “They must have a commander. Hogun? Place those men of Fourth who understand the weapons among your own, have them teach. They have answered to you since – since the attack. They must continue so.”

“Fourth is yours, and Sixth, and they will function as one until the situation changes.”

Hogun bows. “My king.” Turning to face the guildfather, he continues, “How soon can you rebuild the towers?”

Hallorm shakes his head. “We have not the stone in the city. Perhaps by the red of Kaldsjarna.”

As the consultation draws on, so the continued expectation of another battle here scrapes at Thor’s nerves. _Have we not lost enough?_ The shield is broken, and the answer of the Artificers about the repair was similar, even if Odin himself came to organise the magics – and Thor has to think of some way of stopping him from doing that, the last two years have weakened him so much, and whose fault is that? He realises his throat is closing up, and focusses once more on the war. “We should be thinking more of ways to take the battle away from Asgardian skies,” he says slowly.

“No,” his father says. “All of our strength is here, all of our power.” He motions for the others to leave. As he goes, Hogun gently grips Thor's forearm, and Thor gives him the ghost of a nod. As Hogun follows Hallorm, Odin turns to face Thor. “It will not be said of me that I fled the city of my own fathers in fear of a group of creeping dark elves.”

“It would not be flight – it would be relocating the battle away from the greatest losses. If they come again, as they have –”

“He must come to us, and we will be ready, in the most ancient stronghold of our power. Do you think that we could defeat him, anywhere else? We will be ready for him, and his men will fall.”

“And so will we. You were at the funeral, Father. If he comes again, he will break us.” How can he not see that perhaps they are broken already?

“He has but a shipful; we have a people. We have the greatest weapons of the Nine Realms.” Odin takes a step closer and reaches for him, but Thor does not acknowledge the touch. “Your lightning alone can hurt him and his ships.”

“And he can hurt us. We should take Jane away from here – my lightning will work wherever I take it, but their ships can only hurt what they are presented with.” _He has but a shipful._

“If you fail, the Aether will fall to them, and you will doom everything we are sworn to protect.”

“The risk is as great if we fail here – and the loss will be too much even if we succeed.”

Odin looks down, and for a moment Thor thinks he will yield. “This is the only place we will succeed, and I will not abandon it. Every legionary has been called up, every auxiliary. When he comes, he and his men will fall on tens of thousands of Asgardian spears.”

Throwing men at these ships will not work. They have had ample proof of that – and Fandral would agree, Fandral who readily agreed to put his new legion onto the new weapons, Fandral who did throw himself upon them. This is the wrong kind of war – _if I had been more eager, could I have commanded this?_ “How many of ours must fall to their guns, to their ships?”

“As many as are needed.” Odin is not even looking at him now. He is staring past him, shoulders drooping, and even in his heavy armour he seems small and bowed. “We will fight to the last Asgardian breath, to the last drop of Asgardian blood – here. Here where we have a chance.”

 _So you will sacrifice our people to your pride._ Anger does not normally hurt like this. It should be clean, pure, resolute, but now it is thick and heavy and shivering. “Then what makes you any different from Malekith?” Thor sees the strike hit home, sees his father tremble under it – sees him recompose himself to strike back. Before they are anything else, they are warriors.

Odin laughs, a terrible dry laugh that Thor has only heard before from another mouth. “The difference is that I will win,” he spits back. For all it is bitter and empty, for all he is right, Thor knows he has lost. There is still power in a broken throne.

As he leaves, plans spinning through his mind, he looks up at the dark elf ship. When they had first retrieved Fandral’s sword, it had sat at the head of a gash. Now, the smooth, dark covering is whole.


	4. Chapter 4

Jane soon finds out that she cannot manipulate the books well enough to understand them, and the surly old man in a crumpled robe who had let them in does not seem inclined to help. Sif works the communications beam with one hand and turns the pages of a book with another, takes and writes messages, and sometimes receives warriors who look faintly out of place here in this silent cavernous hall of learning; there is no help to come from there. But she can understand what is apparently called a constellation of wisdom, swirling around the great tree – it seems to be some sort of search engine or database, an incomplete record of some of what is included in the library.

It is – hard to comprehend. The language she understands, but the text is filtered through such a different set of principles that it is impossible to skim read and difficult to read at all, and she is finding standing difficult enough as it is. However, accepting defeat is – not an option. She ploughs on, trying to make sense of the highly referential, near-impenetrable Asgardian style.

Behind her another set of boots tramp into hearing, three or four of them, and she jumps, but does not turn around until one of them calls out her name.

Sif has left her post, despite the frantic flickering of the beam, and says, “What is your business here?”

“Lady Sif. The mortal is to come with us, by order of the king.”

“Jane Foster is a part of my household, entrusted to me for her protection according to form of law by Thor Odin’s son.” Jane’s heart hammers, the Aether twisting around inside her and making her feel as though she is swaying. 

“The Allfather will take on your charge.” The Aether wants – does it want? Can it? At any rate, she itches to release it upon the soldier discussing her fate as though she is not there – but she will not. Enough people have suffered for this.

Sif has one hand on her sword – this cannot come to a fight, it must not. “He has no rights over my household.”

“You stand within the Allfather’s household. To refuse him is to break your oath to him.”

“If he violates my rights thus, he breaks his oath to me.”

Her grip is getting tighter on the sword, and Jane makes up her mind. “No,” she says, too quietly, and moves alongside Sif. “Please don’t – it isn’t worth it.”

“My rights are ‘worth it,’ and so is your work and its cause,” Sif says, the weight of her honour pressing upon her. There is little hope this way – is there hope in any way? She will believe it, she has to believe it, and she has more hope in Thor’s plans for Jane than in Odin’s – and for that, she must keep her oath.

The venom in her low voice catches Jane by surprise. “I’m getting nowhere fast, or at all. I don’t want to cause any more fights here. I’m sorry.” Jane remembers the oath she took – is this breaking it? What can you say, when you realise you’ve gone against a major principle? But the thought of Asgardian fighting Asgardian for this makes her feel sick, and it isn’t the Aether causing that. “Would you be in a better position to protest it to whatever you have instead of the Supreme Court if you don’t fight now?”

“You do not understand. Some things I cannot let pass.” She sighs, and perhaps there is weariness in it. Jane presses the possible advantage, trying to bite down on the pleading tone edging its way into her voice.

“Then take it to him. He’ll only send more, and people will die, and that’s what none of us want. Or he’ll arrest you for treason or something, I don’t know.”

Sif looks at her, and understands. “I would not have struck the first blow anyway. Very well; consider yourself released of your oath.” Still, the sting makes her words come out harsher than she means them.

Hearing it hurts. It hurts, but the alternative would be worse. Sif announces her yielding and her intention to make vigorous objection as soon as there is opportunity, and Jane is gathering up her things. It takes concentration to stop her hands shaking, and she resolutely focusses on her next overhaul of her gathered data to avoid thinking about Odin's intentions. When she turns back to look at Sif, she has already stalked back to the communications beam.

-

When the message comes through from the Konungadal communications that Sif is in the library, Thor is glad; it can only mean that Jane is well, working, and able to join Sif and he in discussing the plan he is starting to form. It tastes bitter in his mind, and he is almost afraid to think too hard of it, in case somehow someone can see it. _It is the only way._ If Father will not do what is necessary, he must; but it is so heavy, and the memory of what he thought necessary to do to Jotunheim looms, attacking his resolve. He needs counsel on this.

Sif is alone. The anger grips him by the throat, as it never dared when he faced Father – he refuses it. “Where is Jane?”

“The Allfather sent his men to take her under his protection, and she willingly forfeited mine,” Sif says, and turns away from her work to face him.

“Why?” The plan is crumbling – Father foresaw this, damn him, _Jane, why?_

“She said she wanted no more fights over her.”

For a second he stares at her blankly, but it quickly makes sense. “Jane is not of Asgard, nor a warrior, Sif. She does not understand.” He does, all too clearly, his heart plummetting down infinite wormholes – but suddenly, a thought strikes him, and a smile twitches at the corner of his mouth.

“What’s funny about this?”

By one frame of reference, Jane had made the wrong choice. But still, she is right – and she has removed the last lingering doubt he had about the plan that is swirling itself into being in his mind. “Nothing. You did the right thing, letting her go.”

“The court will not think so. I understand, but Thor – assuming the universe does not fall, I still have a reputation to guard. I cannot let this pass.”

“You did it in service of Asgardian life.” And so did she. If he had ever doubted that Jane would join him in this, heading straight into the jaws of danger to take the battle away from the city, he does not anymore. “And Father would have placed your chambers under siege, which…”

“I know. But it is hard, you should know that. When your honour is questioned, it is as a warrior. When mine is questioned, all but my womanhood is forgotten.”

A detail of the plan falls into place – both for the offence, and the possible defence. If they survive the Convergence, it will become a constitutional battle anyway, and Asgardian law has always accorded a great respect to the honour of high nobles. There are worse ways he can effect one of the most legally dangerous parts of this. “I will not ask you to let this pass. Sif, I have the beginnings of a plan. May I request both your counsel and your spear?” He uses the ancient form of the request, used by their ancestors far back into the mists of time to denote honour and respect.

There are, after all, other sorts of power than a throne.


End file.
